Lucas Matthysse will be looking for another title bout shot which means that upset losses are not an option in his quest for a belt. Roberto Ortiz has never lost a bout in 32 matches but few of his opponents were as tough as Matthysse. Lucas Martin Matthysse will face Roberto Ortiz for the WBC silver light welterweight title on September 6 at the US Bank Arena in Cincinnati, Ohio, USA. Matthysse opened as a -900 favorite with the Boxing odds while Ortiz was a +625 dog.

Roberto “Massa” Ortiz

The 28 year old Roberto Ortiz is a native of Torreon, Coahuila de Zaragoza, Mexico where he still resides. Ortiz is the fourth ranked light welterweight in Mexico and is ranked 39th in the world. Ortiz stands at five feet nine inches tall with a reach of 69 and one half inches and fights from an orthodox stance. He has a career record of 31 wins, 0 losses, and one draw in 32 career bouts as 24 out of his 31 career wins have come by knockout. Ortiz won the WBC Silver light welterweight title on August 25, 2012 with a second round technical knockout win over Florencio Castellano and has successfully defended his title belt in his last five consecutive bouts. Ortiz is coming off a technical knockout win over Ramiro Alcaraz in the fifth round of a scheduled 12 round bout that took place on April 12, 2014.

Lucas Martin “La Maquina” Matthysse

The 31 year old Lucas Martin Matthysse stands at five feet six and one half inches tall with a reach of 69 inches and fights from an orthodox stance. Matthysse is a native of Argentina and still resides there in Junin, Buenos Aires. Matthysse is the top ranked light welterweight in Argentina and is ranked second in the world. He has a career record of 35 wins and 3 losses with 33 out of his 35 career wins coming by knockout. Matthysse has never suffered a knockout defeat. Matthysse is coming off a knockout win over John Molina in the 11th round of a scheduled 12 round bout that took place on April 26, 2014 at the Stub Hub Center in Carson, CA, USA. The win followed his unanimous decision loss to Danny Garcia for the WBA super world light welterweight and WBC light welterweight titles.

The Pick

Ortiz enters this bout with our respect and with credibility but we believe that Matthysse is in an entirely different class and call for Matthysse to win!

If Broner sticks around at 140 he's going to have to fight Mattyhsse, Provodnikov, Postol and a host of other top level contenders in the division. This should be a good fight, if Matthysse's last fight is anything to go by.

The Commish says:

Lucas Matthysse is a cut above what Senor Ortiz is used to facing. Those 24 knockouts in 31 bouts makes him seem like a big puncher, but the fact is, many of those KO's--especially the ones early in his career--came against opponents who had very little experience and/or ability.

Lucas should win this, probably by stoppage. It will be interesting, however, to see if Ortiz is as good as his record indicates he is. Just because he hasn't beaten a list of the division's "Who's Who" doesn't mean he can't win this weekend.

This should be an entertaining fight.

-Randy G.

oubobcat says:

I pulled up some youtube videos on Ortiz. Not a bad fighter but I think the Commish is correct in stating that Matthysse is a cut above.

Ortiz is not a bad puncher but not the puncher his record indicates. If he finds a way to land flush though, he could do so damage.

I noticed a couple things about Ortiz that Haymon's people probably also saw. He is easy to hit. There is zero head movement and he squares up a lot to his opponents. In addition, he has a habit of throwing a lazy jab out and bringing it back to his hip inviting right hand counters. And Ortiz has been on the canvas before.

Ortiz also cuts very easily. The few videos I saw of him there was blood. And he does come straight forward in often leading with his head and has been involved with a lot of head clashes. So this could be somewhat bloody if the fight goes any sort of distance.